Monthly Archives: May 2014

Yes indeed, it’s been another month! And that, of course, means another edition of It Just Got Weirdo: A Wordy Evening @ Weirdo Records!

This coming Tuesday

JOIN US ONCE AGAIN!!! It’ll be an amazing night of comedy, poetry & storytelling as we gather in the awesomest/indiest/tiniest vinyl record shop in Central Sq to celebrate the defeat of one of the most brutal New England winters ever know. It’ll be some serious fun…with no snow…promise!

So that Literary Roast thing that I did ended up being damn fun. Like…a lot. I got my geek on, saw some incredibly talented performers, and comically ribbed/celebrated J.R.R. Tolkien, the scribe of Middle Earth himself, as “The Inventor of Cosplay!” ‘Twas a delightful time.

So much so in fact that I was inspired to select Tolkien as the latest passenger in my every-other-week blog column for The Missouri Review wherein I choose a literary notable (poetry or prose, living or dead) and curate/comment on the “perfect playlist” for picking them up from the airport. I’m not 100% certain that Tolkien would dig Mariah Carey, Blackalicious, & the soundtrack to The Matrix Revolutions as much as I think he would, but dammit I’m sticking to it!Check out the playlist HERE

The latest in my every-other-week series for the blog section of The Missouri Review wherein I curate & comment on the “perfect playlist” for picking up various literary figures from the airport.

Your passenger this week is Japanese novelist, social commentator, and Nobel Laureate Kenzaburo Oe. In a career spanning more than 50 years Oe has returned again and again to topics such as the atomic bomb attacks on Japan in WWII, the modernization/democratization of Japanese society in the 20th century, human dignity, and his relationship with his oldest son (the composer Hikari Oe). A major force in the revitalization of Japanese literature after the war Oe continues to be vital & prolific well into the 21st century.

I just hope he’s into Simple Minds, Compton hip-hop, & the Hyperdub label….

Or at least that’s the story so far. On Monday May 12 check out The Literary Roast at Oberon in Cambridge, MA where I’ll be delivering my best takedown of that overly revered Hobbit author. It will be an exciting evening of comedy, poetry, burlesque, music & more as formerly untouchable literary sacred cows such as Poe, Plath, David Foster Wallace, Emily Dickinson are exposed! This is a crazy collection of Boston talent all in one place for one night only. Booze, boobs, bards & barbs…PLUS Haterade (the evening’s specially designed cocktail). DO IT!

I was happy during the last 2 months or so to participate in a multimedia project by Boston University journalism students that explored almost every facet of Boston comedy (stand-up, sketch, improv, performers, venues, and the general culture of funny in the city). Some of my friends/favorite comedians were also involved. You can CHECK OUT THE FULL PROJECT HERE.

Here’s my individual profile vid. In it I offer some of my own thoughts about performing in Boston, my growth as a comic, and how I handle the week to week of doing this thing I love. Special thanks to Samantha Tatro & the rest of her team for all of their hard work on this super cool project!